Aboriginal activist's anti-Nazi stand remembered

William Cooper's message was finally delivered to Melbourne's German consul-general.

Alick Jackomos Collection: AIATSIS

Members of the Aboriginal and Jewish communities have observed the anniversary of a unique protest in Melbourne.

Seventy-four years ago Aboriginal activist William Cooper and his colleagues at the Australian Aborigines League tried to hand a resolution to the German consul-general condemning the Nazis' persecution of the Jews.

But the consul-general refused to see the Aboriginal delegation, which had walked into town from Mr Cooper's home in Melbourne's west.

"On behalf of the Aboriginal inhabitants of Australia, we wish to have it registered and on record that we protest wholeheartedly at the cruel persecution of the Jewish people by the Nazi government in Germany," his message said.

"We plead that you would make it known to your government and its military leaders that this cruel persecution of their fellow citizens must be brought to an end."

Mr Cooper's descendants, Aboriginal friends, Holocaust survivors and members of the Jewish community today succeeded in handing a replica of the 1938 letter to the current honorary consul-general of Germany.

Mr Cooper's grandson, Alf "Uncle Boydie" Turner, said he was delighted he had finally done what his grandfather had set out to do.

"It means a great deal to me and to the rest of the family, to be here today and to do that and it's something that the family's been speaking about for a number of years and we've finally got around to it," the 88-year-old said.

Mr Cooper was a Yorta Yorta man who devoted much of his life to campaigning for the rights of Indigenous people and became particularly active after moving to Melbourne when he was in his 70s.

When he heard of Kristallnacht and other attacks on Jews in Germany in November 1938, he felt compelled to give his support to their cause, despite the oppression of his own people.

"My grandfather grew up in a rough tent with a mother that wasn't very well, with three siblings, and that was his life until he moved at the age of 14 years and I think that when he got a bit of education, not much but he got enough to put up a fight for his people," Mr Turner said.

Jewish support

Abe Schwartz, a member of Melbourne's Jewish community who helped organise today's re-enactment, said Mr Cooper had a dream to right the wrongs that he found - whether they were of his own people or those of another people.

"When he heard about the wrongs being perpetrated to the Jews of Nazi Europe he tried to right that wrong from a position of no human or civil rights of his own," he said.

"His grandson and family have followed that dream to pursue their grandfather's wishes. As a proud Jew I could not be more delighted.

"It's phenomenal that he had the capacity, the wherewithal, the lateral thinking, the time, the interest to fight for the rights of others and think about the rights of others when he had so many rights of his own to fight for."

Germany's honorary consul-general in Melbourne, Michael Pearce SC, said the German Embassy fully supported the commemoration.

"I feel it's been an opportunity to right a wrong from the past, 74 years ago the then German consul should have accepted this letter and this resolution," he said.

"He refused to do that."

Mr Pearce said it was unclear whether the consul's refusal to accept Mr Cooper's letter in 1938 was due to the message's content or his race.

"We can only speculate about it but there was a sense, I suppose, in those days in which Aborigines were very much invisible members of society," he said.

"The refusal to receive them may well have reflected that as well as the obvious reluctance to accept any acknowledgement of what was being done to the Jews at the time in Germany."

Israel has planted trees in honour of Mr Cooper in the Forest of Martyrs near Jerusalem and there is also a memorial to him at the city's Yad Vashem Holocaust Museum.

The William Cooper Justice Centre is one of the main buildings in Melbourne's legal precinct.